Laila Abdul-Hadi Jadallah (she/her/hers) is a seasoned director, arts researcher, and curator based in Washington, D.C., working at the intersection between contemporary art, cultural diplomacy, and policy. Jadallah has over fifteen years of experience in international, national, and regional museum and gallery exhibitions, public art, interdisciplinary programming, and non-profit and local governmental leadership.
Jadallah is currently serving as the first-ever Manager of Arts and Culture for the City of Frederick where she is developing and implementing the city’s comprehensive arts and culture program strategic plan, overseeing the city’s public art and cultural programs, and art collection. Previously, she was the Director of Exhibitions and Programs at the Qatar America Institute for Culture, guiding exhibitions, interdisciplinary programs, and partnerships. From 2018 to 2022, she served as the inaugural Managing Director of Washington Studio School where she successfully stewarded the organization’s repositioning as a multi-generational and multi-cultural arts space. Throughout her career, Jadallah has worked with numerous emerging and celebrated artists across the United States, the Middle East, North Africa, and their diaspora. As an arts researcher, Jadallah is interested in the alternative histories, new visual languages, and contributions of modern and contemporary diaspora artists to the art historical canon. Her writing has appeared in CCAS Newsmagazine and will be included in two forthcoming anthologies: A Decolonial Guide to Palestine published by Duke University Press and Concentric Circles: In Search of Arab American Art edited by Maymanah Farhat. Her curatorial work has been featured in The Washington Post, Canvas Magazine, The National and more.
She currently serves on the Arts at Mason Board (George Mason University College of Visual and Performing Arts), and previously served on the board of Washington Studio School, and the Executive Committee of the Washington, D.C.-region chapter of ArtTable, Inc. where she cochaired State of Art5/DC: A Conversation at the Smithsonian American Art Museum (2019). Jadallah is a member of Arts Administrators of Color Network, artconnexDC, and the Association of Art Museum Curators.
She received a B.A. from the School of Integrative Studies at George Mason University, and her M.A. from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service (summa cum laude) with a focus on modern and contemporary art history and culture of the Arab world. She is a 2024 U.S. Office of Personnel Management Presidential Management Fellowship Finalist and a Middle East Policy Council 2024 40 Under 40 Awardee for her work in the arts. Previously, she was a Student Fellow at Georgetown’s Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics (2020/2021) and a 2017 and 2019 D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities Artist Fellow.